'Don't forget them'

COEUR d’ALENE — Melanie Fry woke up Monday morning, looked out the window, and saw rain.

Initially, it brought her down. Then, she had a thought.

“Rain can be a beautiful thing, too,” Fry said. 

The University of Idaho-Coeur d’Alene student knew that in a few hours, she and others would be planting tulip bulbs in memory of four UI students slain a year ago off the UI campus in Moscow.

And rain, she realized, would help those tulips grow. 

“A form of new life that’s going to bring smiles to lots of faces,” Fry said.

The short ceremony, held in a steady rain as traffic rumbled past, brought together about 15 people at the Harbor Center sign on Hubbard Avenue.

Before they left, they took turns pushing dirt aside, placing a bulb into the earth, and covering it up.

Their hopes are that memories of Ethan Chapin, Xana Kernodle, Madison Mogen and Kaylee Goncalves will live on in the small garden and unite the Vandal family.

“It’s important to remember,” said Kathy LeFlore. “You don’t want to push it away.”

She said she was a military spouse for 26 years.

“We’ve been through this. We’re like, ‘Always say their name,'" LeFlore said. "That’s how you remember them.”

Michael Wood, UI-CDA building superintendent, said pulling together in trying times is critical.

“That’s what we want to do as a Vandal family is support each other,” he said.

Wood kneeled as he planted several tulip bulbs. Black buttons with the words, "Vandal Strong" rested on a table just a few feet away.

“This is a moment I know I’m going to remember,” he said.

Mogen, of Coeur d’Alene, and Goncalves, of Rathdrum, were best friends. Kernodle and Chapin were dating. Kernodle was from Post Falls and Chapin was from Mount Vernon, Wash. 

Bryan Kohberger is charged with four counts of murder in connection with their deaths.

Kate Colvin, assistant of alumni relations UI-CDA, said in conversations with Ethan Chapin’s parents, Jim and Stacy Chapin, they expressed fear their son would be forgotten.

She said Stacy Chapin told her, “Never stop sharing their stories, never stop talking about them.”

“Don’t forget them,” Colvin said. “Share them.”

Colvin said many handle grief in their own way. She asked those present to take out their phones and add 208-885-6716, the number for UI mental health, to their contacts. She said to use it as needed and share it.

Together, she said they could express their feelings and begin to heal.

“That’s what makes us and the Vandal community strong,” Colvin said.

UI-CDA students Hunter Hawkins and Mary Everett also attended the memorial.

Hawkins said he was there for his Vandal family and also the Coeur d’Alene community.

“Being from Coeur d’Alene and growing up here, I have a big sense of pride in that,” he said. 

Everett said this generation of Vandals has endured hard times.

“We go through things together,” she said. 

Fry, who knew Kernodle, said all four students were “incredible human beings.”

She asked for a moment of silence and that the attention not be on their tragic deaths, but called for “celebrating the lives of these beautiful people.”

“Live through them. Live with them,” she said. “Remember, honor, never forget. These were incredible people.”

    Melanie Fry, left, and Kate Colvin hug during a planting of tulip bulbs in a memorial garden at the Harbor Center sign on Hubbard Avenue on Monday.

   Vandal Strong buttons sit on a table at a new memorial garden at the Harbor Center sign on Hubbard Avenue on Monday.

    Shovels and tulips sit on a table at the memorial garden at the Harbor Center sign on Hubbard Avenue on Monday.
  

    Michael Wood plants a tulip bulb in a memorial garden at the Harbor Center sign on Hubbard Avenue on Monday.